I send a semi-daily email delivering insights into leadership in exponential times. For entrepreneurs, corporate irritants and change makers. Raw, unfiltered and opinionated. It is called The Heretic and here is the dispatch from 2014-08-13:

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THE CREATION STORY

Creationists believe that the world came into existence in an act of divine creation. It’s a beautiful and simple story — six days was all it took. Science tells us pretty much the opposite: The act of creation is messy, ugly, brutal, random, complex…

Founding stories are often the entrepreneur’s version of creationism- they make us believe that great companies where conceived at the kitchen table, product/market fit came overnight and the growth curve was always in the shape of a hockey stick.

Sadly that’s very, very rarely true. Birthing a company often looks much more like the fabled history of our own planet. Massive meteors knocking parts out of our companies (as happened in the incident which created the moon) or the complete extinction of once dominant products (as was the case with the dinosaurs).

As much as we want to believe that building companies is this beautiful journey with lots of smiling faces, fun stories to tell and happy endings — it is not. And that’s fine. Cherish the learnings, live in the moment, and know that what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger.